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loudblonde · 1 year

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"The Last Person Left" Simon "Ghost" Riley/John "Soap" MacTavish & Male Reader

Summary: After the death of John "Soap" MacTavish, a funeral is held for the family left behind, right next to Simon "Ghost" Riley, the married couple is finally together in death and in peace. (Y/N), asked by the grandchildren left behind, shares a relatively innocent if not funny story from when both men were still alive and working in the military, albeit a bit sanitised for the children's ears.

Warnings: This will be discussing a bit of death as well as being in a funeral. Do not read if you are not comfortable with this discussion.

Additional notes: This is part two to my werewolf series, if you click on the link to Ao3 you can find part one called "A little wolf and its handler" I also posted it on here but I don't know how to leave the little links.

Words: 1200

The day was cold, moisture clung to the air signalling rain to come. (Y/N) knelt down, his knee instantly getting wet from the dew of the rain. His calloused hand swept over the first gravestone, getting all dirt and debris off it. He looked to the other, much newer and still white. “I will miss you both, more than you will ever realise.” He whispered before placing the flowers on the graves. He stood up and stepped back.

Simon Riley

19XX - 20XX

John MacTavish

19XX - 20XX

(Y/N) had been in their lives for so long and yet the man himself was barely greying despite it all. John’s deterioration as Alzheimer's took root in ways (Y/N) couldn’t help him. It was hard on the man, though equally hard on the kids left behind, both the adult people who already looked older than (Y/N) himself, and people (Y/N) had helped raise.

Their kids in all but blood. While (Y/N) had never been romantically involved with Simon or John, they still were strong together, they still belonged together. They were a unit, both in the field but also as civilians. Instead of fighting for their lives, they were raising children together and… well two of them had grown old together, leaving just the wolf behind.

A choke forced its way through his throat. (Y/N) felt a comforting hand on his shoulder as he turned to look at their oldest kid standing beside him, his own daughter at his side. “It’s alright Pa, Dad and Father are together now, neither of them is in pain. Come on, let's head inside.”

As they all walked inside, (Y/N) scooped his granddaughter up in his arms, holding her close. She was crying silently and no one could do anything. So, he just held onto her. He would be the pillar their family needed, everyone would mourn, get through it and move on, even if (Y/N) couldn’t.

Once inside, coffee, cake and some sandwiches were brought out. People smiled and shared stories. They celebrated the life that had been as both men would have wanted. One of the grandkids looked at (Y/N) with big eyes and asked, “Grandpa, what did you and grandfather and grandad do for work?” The room got a bit tense, as the past was never discussed while the two men were alive.

Though (Y/N) leaned forward and looked at the kid with a small smile. “We helped protect the world from evil people.” He said, a twinkle of amusement in his eyes.

The children all gathered around and sat down. “Like a superhero?” One of the kids asked and (Y/N) nodded before chuckling to himself.

“Yes, much like a superhero. We…” (Y/N) knew he couldn’t share much of their time in the military. Between the war crimes, brutal killings, weapons of mass destruction and (Y/N)’s own personal transformation on certain occasions, the stories were nothing that children should hear. “We did a lot of bad things to bad people, I can’t talk about it. They are secrets and I am a good secret keeper. But, without what we did, this world would be a lot more different than it is today.”

“Pleaseee Grandpa, just tell us one story.” His granddaughter asked.

(Y/N) smiled fondly. “When you all get older, I will.” He said. “Though, I can tell you a story from one time on base when we were bored.” That got everyone's attention. Adult as well as child. People pulled up chairs as (Y/N) leaned back.

“We had just gotten off mission a week prior and nothing was set to happen for a full two more weeks, but we couldn’t leave as we could get a call at any second. So,” he looked around the room, “your granddad, grandfather and I all decided to mess around with some of the recruits and create a legend in the area. My transformation was still hidden back then, we didn’t want too many to find out.” He chuckled fondly at the memory and thought back to it.

“Soap, ya dunce, are you certain that we can pull this off?” (Y/N), half naked and still very human, asked.

“I wouldn’y worry about that, Beast. Just be quiet and ye shouldn’y worry about a’body finding out.” Soap said, crackling like a maniac.

“Speak English.” Ghost said, though made no attempts at stopping either of them. Far too bored to even care about it.

“Aye, I shall when you stop being crabbit.” Soap said. “Aff with yer clothes. Just a wee wolf. Don’t go all Lycan on us.”

“Ha. Ha. McTavish.” (Y/N) said monotone. “If you aren’t careful I will just eat you.” (Y/N) dropped his pants and started the transformation. It was quick. Not having to go full-on wolf but rather a less-haired lycan, complete with fully white eyes and black fur that almost seemed to curl at certain points on the body, took less than a toll on the body.

Ghost walked over to the wolf, which still stood taller than he was but not by the usual impressive amount. “Down to the lake, scare a few of the soldiers walking, don’t get seen and come back.” He gave the order with practised ease before opening the door to the tool shed.

(Y/N) went out quickly, easily falling into the shadows of the night.

“In the end, we got caught by Price and scolded for trying to scare people and he forced us to be on clean-up duty for the full two weeks while we waited for something to do, since we clearly were bored.” (Y/N) said, chuckling. A few of his grandkids chuckled at the story.

(Y/N) looked over to the doorway as he felt new eyes on him. He saw the familiar, though now white-haired, Garrick standing in the doorway. “So that’s why you were all scrubbing the toilet for weeks. Price never told me why.”

(Y/N) nodded and shrugged before standing up. “It was fun. Not the clean-up detail, but getting into shit with 'em both.”

Garrick chuckled. “Come on, old man, let's get you home.”

(Y/N) bid his family goodbye and headed with Garrick towards where he lived. (Y/N) took care of the team and would do so until they all died. Perhaps he would find the ones like him afterwards. They could all live out their lives in the mountains where no one would find them. Or, perhaps, (Y/N) could return to Canada, and find his biological family or whatever is left of them.

He didn’t have any plans despite having close to 200 years left in him before his body would break down beyond repair. His bones already ached from over a hundred years of active service. He had always dreaded civilian life but now, it seemed to suit him well. (Y/N) wanted to at least see his children to the grave before disappearing. So far, all he had was no plans and a lot of time on his hands. At least another 50 years of being Grandpa. 50 years without his life partners.

#cod x male reader #male reader #cod men x male reader #john 'soap' mactavish x simon 'ghost' riley #simon ghost riley x male reader #simon ‘ghost’ riley x male reader #simon riley x male reader #john “soap” mctavish x male reader

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hollywoodxwhore · 1 year

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Mine | Chapter Fifteen

Colson x Original Female Character

Synopsis: Presley may look sinful on the outside, but deep down, she's innocent, guarded, and terrified of intimacy. Colson, on the other hand, is living up to his womanizer reputation as a way to cope with heartbreak. When his new guitarist invites his twin sister to join them on tour, Colson discovers that he's actually capable of feeling. Will Presley and Colson be able to push past all of the barriers trying to prevent them from happening?

Content/Warnings: very brief mentions of smut, swearing, the sappiest fluffiest shit you've ever read

Tag List: @triplexdoublex @jaxbreaker @mgklove99xx @jinx-on-mars-19xx @iamnotanearthlingmotherfucker @missamericanaxx @anonymousme86 @whiteleoqueen @feroniakutenpuu

And with that, Mine has come to an end. I cannot thank you all enough for reading this and showing me so much love and positive feedback. I loved every second of writing this fic and I'm not ready to be done with it. That being said...

OURS COMING SOON! You all asked for more smut and more Presley and Colson cuteness, so @triplexdoublex had the idea of writing a second series that follows Presley and Colson in their new life together living in LA. You can expect smut and fluff, minor angst (unless I decide I need some. Ya girl loves writing angst). Serious shoutout to Roxy for the title idea and the idea to write a second series! I can't wait to see what y'all think of it. Thanks again for all the love you've shown Mine. Enjoy this last chapter!

Colson

It’s the last night of the tour and I couldn’t be happier.

Our biggest tour yet. A new guitarist who we all love. And the best part for me – the girl waiting backstage for me to finish performing so she can jump into my arms.

It’s become our little routine since we’ve been ‘out of hiding’ from our friends. The world doesn’t know yet, and we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it. But every time I come offstage, Pres is there, and she jumps into my arms, wrapping her long limbs around me, and I swear, nothing makes me happier than kissing her and holding her in front of our friends, showing everyone how happy I am.

Cash came around quickly. He and I are closer than ever, and all of the tension has melted away. These past couple of weeks have been a great time, and I’m a little disappointed that the tour is ending. But now, Presley and I can figure out our lives, and that makes me really excited.

After our encore, we leave the screaming crowd behind and head backstage. My eyes search for her immediately, almost frantically, and there she stands, intent on taking my breath away.

She wears her hair in twin buns, soft tendrils of her black hair framing her face, and she wears leather pants (my favorite) with boots and a crop top. Her face lights up when she sees me and I open my arms. She grins wider and runs to me, throwing herself into my arms. I grin widely as I snuggle her, supporting her weight with my arms tucked beneath her butt.

“You did so good!” she gushes, and her breath smells like bubblegum. I shiver a little, fighting the way my dick already wants to harden in my pants.

“I love you,” I mumble into her neck, pressing a kiss to her skin.

“I love you, too,” she says, resting her head against mine. “I’m so proud of you, baby.” I smile, heart bursting.

“Yo, Kells, Presley,” Sam calls. “Can I take some pictures?”

“Hell yeah,” I say. Pres pulls back from the hug a little and I raise a brow questioningly. She nods, smiling, and presses her cheek to mine as we face Sam. We smile and then he takes one of us kissing. I let her down onto the floor and she hugs my waist for another picture. We fit so perfectly together. Suddenly, I want the world to know. I want to post those pictures on the internet for everyone to see, so everyone knows I’m spoken for.

Arm around Presley’s shoulder, we head back to my dressing room where I strip out of my sweaty clothes and go into the adjoining bathroom for a quick shower. I’m sweaty as hell, and we’re going out tonight. Presley sits on the couch with her phone while I shower.

I’m singing in the shower, so fucking happy with my life. Once I’m done, I towel off and then head over to my girlfriend. She lifts her eyes from her phone and drags them from my head to my feet. Jade eyes darken and her pretty lips quirk into a little smirk. It sends a shiver through me and I give the base of my cock a squeeze, gulping. Not now. Everyone’s eager to go out. Maybe I can sneak her into the bathroom again.

Presley giggles with satisfaction and sits back, looking at her phone again. Flustered, I quickly get dressed in a pair of black jeans and a t-shirt, sliding into my Vans. “You ready?” I ask, and she nods, getting to her feet. I offer my hand and she takes it, but when she starts to leave the room, I tug her back into my chest. My arm goes around her waist and I rock her slightly, looking down at her. She softens immediately and smiles up at me.

“Hey, pretty girl,” I murmur.

“Hey,” she says, cheeks pink with pleasure. I smile and lean down to kiss her softly, slowly. She sighs and presses on her toes to get closer, her hands going to the back of my neck. “Mm, do we have to go out?” she asks against my lips.

I chuckle. To be honest, I don’t really want to go out. Pres, Cash, Olivia, and I leave tomorrow to head back to Michigan. We’re going to help Presley get packed and Cash is going to be able to grab a few more things to bring back with him to LA. I want a good fuck and a good night’s sleep before that happens, but it’s the last night of the tour, and it’s tradition. I sigh and she nods, resolved.

“I promise we’ll have so much time just the two of us,” I say, twisting my fingers gently around the strands of hair framing her face. Fuck, I want to grab one of those buns while I’m behind her– “With the tour ending, it’s all us, baby.” I interrupt my own dirty thought process, knowing how easy it would be to hole up in the hotel with my girl.

“Alright, let’s go,” she mutters, and I bite my cheek to stop a grin. She’s cute when she pouts.

We leave the dressing room and go out to one of the waiting cars, climbing into the back. As we settle in and the driver takes off, my phone vibrates and I pull it from my pocket. It’s Sam. Thought you might want these bro! See ya later! I scroll up slightly and my chest warms. They’re the pictures of me and Pres backstage.

“Hey,” I say, tapping her thigh. “Look.”

She leans into me, looking over my shoulder, and smiles. “Aw, those are so cute!” she gushes. “Send them to me!”

“Can I post one of them?” I blurt.

Presley looks surprised, lips parting a little as she looks up at me. “You…you’re ready for that?” I nod, studying her expression. “Are you…not?”

Presley considers, trapping her bottom lip between her teeth. Then, slowly, she nods, meeting my eyes again. “I think so,” she says. “I mean, I don’t want to hide us.”

I grin and lean in for a kiss. “Me neither,” I agree. “I want the world to know you’re mine.”

Pres grins and nuzzles into my shoulder, giving my thigh a squeeze. “I love you, ya big sap,” she tells me, and maybe I am a sap, but I don’t give a fuck. It’s worth it for Presley.

As we head to the bar, I take my time creating an Instagram post. My caption is all about the tour and how thankful I am for how it went. I don’t include anything about Presley in the caption, but I figure the pictures of us kissing and me holding her are enough for people to get the idea. “Can I tag you?” I ask, and she nods. I add the tags, scroll through the photo set once more, and take a deep breath.

“You sure about this?” I ask her.

“Positive,” she says. “If you are.”

With that, I hover my thumb over the post button and then tap.

By the time our flight lands in Detroit the following evening, all four of us are running on fumes.

It’s late and the airport isn’t very busy, so it’s easy enough to grab our luggage and find our way to where Presley and Cash’s parents are waiting for us. I’m a little nervous about meeting them for the first time, especially with how exhausted I am, but I’m excited, too. Presley is my future, and I want to know her parents.

We walk outside into the frigid, early December air and immediately, Cash starts laughing. He drops his bags and jogs over to a waiting car where a tall woman with short, black hair hops out of the car with open arms. Presley runs over, too, and an even taller man circles the car with a grin identical to Presley’s.

“There’s my girl,” he says and catches Presley as she throws herself into his arms. He kisses her cheek and I can’t help but smile. I follow her as Cash introduces Olivia to his mom, waiting a bit anxiously. Presley lets go of her dad and turns to me, putting a hand on my back.

“Dad, this is Colson,” she says, looking up at me lovingly. “Colson, this is my dad, David.”

“Colson,” her dad says, reaching out a hand. I take it and shake it firmly. “It’s so great to finally meet you.” He pulls me in for a hug and I’m surprised but relieved. “Thank you for being so great to my kids.”

“My pleasure,” I tell him. He pulls back and gestures for his wife to join us.

“Colson, this is my mom, Scarlett. Mom, Colson.”

Presley’s mom is just as gorgeous as her kids and she smiles brightly when she sees me. “Wow, you’re even cuter in person,” she says, stepping forward to hug me.

“Mom!” Presley hisses, embarrassed, but I just snicker.

“Oh, Pres,” her mom tuts, reaching out to fix a loose piece of her daughter’s hair. “I’m old, not blind.”

“What do you expect?” David says. “We send our kids on tour with a band and they come back with beautiful partners.”

“Exactly,” Scarlett says, wrapping an arm around Cash.

“Can we go now?” Presley asks around a yawn. “I’m about to fall asleep standing up.”

“You got it,” David says, going back around to the driver’s seat. We all pile into the SUV, Presley and I taking the far back. My legs are squished and I’m so tired my eyes burn but I don’t even care. I’m so happy right now I could burst.

Presley looks over at me once her dad starts driving, and her smiles is so affectionate and loving that it turns my heart to mush in my chest. I wrap an arm around her and tug her close, pressing my lips to her forehead. “I love you,” I murmur, loud enough so only she can hear over the other conversations happening in the car.

“I love you, too,” she replies quietly, resting her head on my shoulder.

Before I know it, we’re pulling into an apartment complex. Presley straightens, which tells me that this is her apartment complex. We’re at her home. David parks in front of a building and he and Scarlett both hop out to help us get our things.

“We’ve got it,” I assure them, but Scarlett shakes her head.

“I insist,” she says. “I know you kids are exhausted.”

I can’t argue there.

We say our goodbyes to Cash and Olivia, and then Presley leads the way up to her second story apartment, unlocking the door. She flicks on a light and immediately, I love it here. It’s so Presley.

“Alright,” Scarlett says, wrapping an arm around Presley. “We’ll see you tomorrow for dinner, right?”

“Right,” Presley says, hugging her mom. “Thank you so much for the ride, you guys.”

“Of course,” David says, giving her a squeeze.

“Yes, thank you so much,” I add, and Scarlett hugs me tightly.

“Thanks for taking care of our girl,” she says, and my heart warms.

“Always,” I tell her. We share a little moment, her expression one of admiration, and then we bid her parents goodbye.

Presley locks the door behind them and sighs heavily, slumping. “Holy shit,” she mutters. “I need to go to bed, like, five hours ago.”

I chuckle and nod. “Come on. Show me your bedroom,” I insist.

She flicks off the light and uses her phone flashlight to illuminate the way. She flicks on her bedroom light which is somehow wired to be from a lamp rather than the overhead fixture. “Wow,” I say as I look around. No wonder she never wanted to leave the house.

Her bed looks like the comfiest bed I’ve ever seen in my life, full of well broken-in pillows and soft blankets. The decorations are tasteful and comforting, and it smells sweet, just like Presley. I come up behind her and wrap my arms over her shoulders, squeezing her. “I like your room,” I tell her.

“Me too,” Presley agrees. “I love my room. I love my bed.”

“Yeah, that looks like an amazing bed.”

Pres turns in my arms and wraps her arms around my neck. “Let’s get ready for bed,” she says, giving me a kiss. I nod and let her go.

Ten minutes later, after brushing our teeth and taking off most of our clothes, Presley’s fan is on and we’re snuggling up under her blankets. It’s a little cold in here; Presley had the heat turned down to save on energy, but the bed is warm and so is Presley. I snuggle up to her, pulling her back to my chest, and sigh, closing my stinging eyes.

“Thanks for letting me come home with you,” I murmur, kissing her shoulder.

Presley hums. “Thanks for coming with me,” she says sleepily. “I love you,” she adds after a moment.

“I love you,” I agree, smiling. Minutes later, we’re asleep in her bed, and it excites me knowing her nights here are limited. Soon, we’ll be falling asleep together in our bed.

Presley

Leaving home is going to be bittersweet. There’s no doubt about that.

As Colson and I drive into the city to my shop, I can’t help but take my fill of my surroundings. I’m going to miss all the pine trees, the heavy snow. I’ll miss my quiet apartment complex with its pool and its noisy air conditioner. I’ll miss being so close to my parents. But honestly, that’s about it.

I’m not sad about leaving the tattoo shop. I loved it here and it served its purpose, but I’m ready to move on. I used my job as a way to hide from life, and I’m not interested in hiding anymore. I want to embrace my life, to enjoy my twenties with the man I love in a city I love.

Colson’s hand rests on my jean-clad thigh as we drive into the city. He stares out the window the entire time. “It reminds me a lot of home here,” he says. “Cleveland.”

“Yeah?” I ask. “How so?”

Colson shrugs. “I don’t know,” he admits. “Just does. It’s nice.”

“Do you miss it?” I ask, glancing over at him.

Colson nods. “I do,” he says. “I mean, I’m happy to be out of there, don’t get me wrong. But I do miss simpler times.”

“That makes sense,” I reply.

“Are you going to miss it here?” he asks.

“Not really,” I admit. “I’ll miss my parents. But otherwise, I’m not really sad to be leaving this behind.”

Colson looks over at me and smiles, and I steal a glance at his gorgeous face, cheeks pink from the cold. “Good,” he says. He lifts my hand to his lips and kisses my knuckles.

I pull into the tattoo shop and park in my usual spot in the back lot. No one knows I’m coming today, but it’s a Sunday, so I know several artists will be here, as well as the other piercer. I lead the way inside, Colson’s hand in mine, and Emmy behind the front desk spots me first.

She gasps. “Presley!” she says, hurrying around from behind the desk to hug me. “Oh my god! You’re back!”

“Hey, Emmy,” I say, smiling as I hug her. “It’s so good to see you!”

“Wait, Pres is here?” Derek appears from his room and opens his arms for a big bear hug.

“Hey,” I tell him. “It’s so good to see you guys.”

“You too,” Derek says. He raises a brow. “Um, Presley?” he asks.

“Yes?” I ask, pulling away to study his face curiously.

“Did you bring Machine Gun Kelly into our tattoo shop?” he asks, his eyes on Colson.

I grin widely and go over to my boyfriend, wrapping my arm around his waist. “I sure did,” I say. “Emmy, Derek, meet Colson. My boyfriend.”

Emmy’s eyes widen. “Are you fucking serious?”

“Shit, we heard the rumors but I didn’t know it was true!” Derek says. “That’s awesome, Pres! Welcome to the shop, man.” He reaches out a hand and Colson shakes it.

“Thanks, man,” he says. “It’s dope as fuck here.”

“We like it,” Emmy says.

“Is that Presley?” Blaze calls. I can hear the sound of his tattoo gun buzzing.

“Sure is!” I call. “Come say hi when you have a break!”

“She brought Machine Gun Kelly with her!” Derek calls, and I stifle a laugh.

“No she didn’t!” Blaze calls.

“Come see for yourself!”

Blaze’s machine turns off and he appears around the corner, peeling off his gloves. He freezes mid step when he sees Colson, and Emmy, Derek, and I burst into laughter. “Hey, B,” I greet.

Blaze looks shocked as he hugs me. “Holy shit,” he says, reaching out to shake Colson’s hand. “Welcome, dude. It’s so cool to meet you.”

“Yeah, you too,” Colson says, smiling. I know he’s wary about meeting new people. Not everyone has a very positive opinion of my boyfriend, even if their opinions are unfounded. But I know Blaze is a fan. He played Tickets almost every single day in the shop when he found out Cash was going on tour with them.

Gracen appears from the back and her eyes are wide. “I heard Machine Gun Kelly was here,” she says. “Oh, and you too, Presley.”

“Bitch,” I say with a grin, and my other piercer smiles widely as she hugs me. “It’s good to see you.”

“You back for good?” she asks. “Because no offense, but I’m making good ass money.”

“Keep on making it,” I say. “I’m moving to LA.”

“What?” Emmy and Blaze say in unison.

“Shit, Pres, that’s awesome,” Derek says with a grin. “I’m really happy for you.”

“Can I come visit?” Emmy asks.

“Of course. Is anyone else here?” I ask.

“Sadie,” Emmy says. Sadie is who I brought with me to the show. She’s another tattoo artist here. “She’s finishing up right now. Should be out soon.”

“Taking care of our girl?” Gracen asks Colson, a stern look on her face.

Colson chuckles and nods, looking over at me. “Doing my best,” he says.

I smile and wrap my arm around his waist again. “To be honest, I’ve never been happier,” I say. My friends all look delighted for me, and a part of me is a little sad to be leaving them. Colson drops a kiss to the top of my head and I know I’ve made the right choice to move in with him.

“Well, I just came to get some of my stuff and say hi and bye to you all,” I say.

“Damn,” Derek says, shaking his head. “How life has changed.”

“It certainly has,” I agree.

We all chat for a while longer, and after goodbye hugs all around, Colson and I leave the shop. We spend the rest of the day packing up my apartment with the help of Cash, Olivia, and my parents, and with all of us working together, we get everything packed. Most of it is going to my parents’ house, but some of it is coming to LA with us.

We eat dinner at my parents’ house, watch movies together, stay up late talking, and finally, Colson and I retire to my old bedroom. The bed is far too small for us, but we don’t mind snuggling so we can both fit. We had very sneaky and hopefully very quiet sex, and now we’re lying naked in bed, wrapped up in each other’s arms. I’ve never been so happy in my entire life.

“Are you ready to leave tomorrow?” Colson asks me, his fingertips stroking lightly up and down my arm.

I nod. “Yeah. I am,” I say. “It’s bittersweet, like I said, but I’m ready to start a new life with you.”

Colson smiles against my hairline. “Can’t wait,” he says. “My house is so lonely with just me living there. It’ll be nice to have you with me.”

I smile and press a kiss to his chest. “I can’t believe this is real.”

“Me neither,” Colson agrees. “I never thought anything like this would happen. Thought I’d be alone forever.”

“Me too.” I trace one of the tattoos on his chest. “You sure you’re ready for a lifetime of this?”

Colson smiles and kisses my lips. “Yeah, Pres. I’m positive.”

In less than 24 hours, we’re standing in the doorway of Colson’s house, now my house, too. The sprawling staircase that leads up to our bedroom is welcoming. A gigantic sectional in the living room promises endless days of reading and snuggling. The pool in the backyard tempts us to go for a late night swim. And even though I haven’t even officially moved in yet, this feels like home.

Colson wraps his arms around my waist and rests his chin on my head. “I love you, Presley,” he says. “Thank you for taking a chance on me.”

“I love you, too,” I say happily, covering his hands with my own. “Man. I can’t believe this is even real life.”

“Look around, baby,” Colson says, rocking me in his arms, reminding me that I’m home. “This is all ours.”

#machine gun kelly #mgk #colson baker #machine gun kelly fanfic #mgk fanfic #colson baker fanfic #machine gun kelly x ofc #mgk x ofc #colson baker x ofc

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pixelgrotto · 4 months

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Top-down Planes Galore

Over the last few years, thanks to my wife's English side of the family, I've visited a fair share of interesting British museums. One of these is the Shuttleworth Collection, a neat place that features an array of planes from the early half of the 20th century. If you're ever in Bedfordshire and have a hankering to see biplanes from the 1920s, I really can't recommend a visit enough. I wouldn't call myself an aviation geek, but there's something about seeing a World War II aircraft in person that stirred my imagination, and one of the souvenirs I bought from my visit was a cool pair of socks that had pixelated biplanes on them.

I specifically bought the socks because they reminded me of Capcom's 1942, the first entry in the 19XX series of shoot 'em ups, AKA shmups. Honestly, I hadn't played much of 1942 at the time, but I've always known enough about shmups to think of the game when I see pixelated biplanes. It probably stands out in my head as an interesting example of a Japanese company making a product where the whole goal is to blow up the Japanese. Yep, 1942 puts the player in the role of a Lockheed P-38 Lightning pilot maneuvering his aircraft through the skies of the Pacific Theater, on a mission to reach Tokyo and blast the heck out of everything. Apparently the game was made with Western audiences in mind, so I suppose we have capitalism to thank for a game that is both historically accurate and not historically accurate at all. (Yes, Japan lost the war, but I don't think any of the Lockheeds in the Battle of Midway had spray guns capable of shooting a billion bullets at once.)

I recently dove into 1942 and almost all of the other games in the 19XX series, mostly because I was inspired by my British nephew, who's recently been going on about planes for hours on end. You can play almost all of them via the Capcom Arcade Stadium compilations on Steam, which repackage classic arcade games and make them easily playable without the hassle of needing to fiddle with MAME emulation. (The decision to make each game DLC that you have to buy is probably questionable, but putting that aside, these packages are pretty okay.)

Anyway, I soon discovered that the original 1942 is the epitome of a 1980s arcade quarter gobbler, with a staggering 32 levels of monotony and some of the most annoyingly tinny background music known to man. It's fun to do loops around Japanese bombers for the first ten minutes, and I've always loved the power-up that gives you two flanking planes that help soak up extra damage, which would go on to be a series staple. Beyond that, 1942 grates at the soul and has not aged well.

1943: The Battle of Midway, and its slightly remixed semi-sequel 1943 Kai, are much better. Here, we bear witness to screen-filling tsunami attacks that can instantly wreck all enemies, a more forgiving difficulty level, and varied stages that don't consist of simply flying over the ocean and rice paddies. Everything's faster and a good deal more fun, and instead of solely taking down planes, now you've got boss battles against Imperial Japanese naval fleets, ending in a fight against the battleship Yamato. And thankfully, the tinny music is gone and replaced by battle-ready tracks that are nicely catchy.

This formula is refined even further in the later games, all of which loosen up on the feeling of "one American plane versus Japan" for a progressively zanier feel. 1941: Counter Attack ditches the Pacific Theater for firefights over European skies, and despite taking place in the earlier years of WWII, your pilot goes up against enemy crafts that are so extreme in size and flavor that they border on science fiction. You'll fire away at German rockets that look like they're designed to fly to the moon and tanks that take up a quarter of the screen. The end boss is a Horten Ho 229, the German prototype bomber that never went into mass production, yet is a formidable foe in this game that is sleek and almost alien-like in its movements.

19XX: The War Against Destiny takes that science fiction appeal to the maximum and says, "To hell with a historical shmup, let's go to the future with two X's, baby!" In an amusing move that would later be replicated by the Call of Duty series two decades later (when they jumped from WWII to the arena of Modern Warfare - and later Advanced Warfare), 19XX sees you taking on the Outer Limits, a terrorist organization that somehow has a futuristic army with hundreds of expendable fighter pilots. For the first time, you can choose between three different planes: the old school Lockheed P-38 Lightning (the well-balanced one), the de Havilland DH.98 Mosquito (the heavy firepower one), and the Kyushu J7W Shinden (the speedy one). All of these planes are worthy options against enemies that scale in a ludicrous fashion, and one of the bosses in the later levels is basically a mech. It's great. And because the game runs on Capcom's CPS-2 arcade board, which also powered the Street Fighter Alpha/Zero series, the action is fast and clean to a degree that's very reminiscent of the company's fighting game output.

1944: The Loop Master is the last 19XX game I played, because it's the last one available in the Capcom Arcade Stadium. It takes the action back to WWII, but the gusto and fury of all the futuristic stuff exhibited in 19XX: The War Against Destiny is present and accounted for. Hello, my biplane can shoot lasers? Sure, why not! Technically, this one was developed by Eighting and not by Capcom, and all I know about Eighting is that they made the Bloody Roar games and Battle Garegga, another shmup with a cool soundtrack that samples the techno track "Jupiter Jazz," by Underground Resistance. They did a good job, and while 1943 and 19XX: The War Against Destiny stick out in my memory more than The Loop Master, I can safely say that this one features a little dude who parachutes out of your plane when you die. About time I finally saw my pilot!

Honestly, I'm not a great shmup player. I played all of these casually on my Steam Deck, and I never would've made a dent in them in the arcades. But there's something about the 19XX series that's appealing to me, at the very least on an aesthetic level. It's probably the highly detailed 2D pixelated artistry that goes into the top-down depiction of these warplanes, which are given the same slavish fanboyism that you see in Japanese mecha franchises. I think back to the several times I've visited Japan and been to antiwar exhibits like the Hiroshima Peace Memorial. Minus a few groups of nationalist nutjobs, Japan's by far and large a deeply antiwar country - but there do exist otaku who nerd out over WWII-era tech, usually not in a "the Imperial Japanese Army was right" sort of way, but in a way that basically says, "the Yamato was one of the biggest battleships ever constructed at 70,000+ tons, I shall now proceed to write an essay about why that was cool." And you know, I can appreciate that attention to technical detail, just like how I can respect the planes on exhibit in the Shuttleworth Collection. So give the 19XX games a whirl if you like planes or simply dig fine artistry - and go visit the Shuttleworth and buy those socks while you're at it.

#pixel grotto #now playing #1942 #1943: the battle of midway #1941: counter attack #19xx: the war against destiny #1944: the loop master

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arcadefan · 5 months

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I'm a big fan of the 194X series of vertical shoot 'em ups by Capcom. This one for the 1995 arcade shooter 19XX: The War Against Destiny captures the frenetic action with the 3 player fighters (the Lockheed P-38 Lightning, deHavilland DH.98 Mosquito, and Kyushu J7W1 Shinden) diving headlong into battle with enemy fighters and bosses.

#19xx #arcade #arcade art #194x

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ao3feed-twiyor · 2 months

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Face me

read it on AO3 at https://ift.tt/OwHZTs6 by MDSpencer XX/XX/19XX After four months, Twilight was found in an SSS hideout, with several more destroyed tapes. Words: 1205, Chapters: 1/?, Language: English Series: Part 2 of Tapes Fandoms: SPY x FAMILY (Manga), SPY x FAMILY (Anime) Rating: Mature Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Categories: F/M, Gen Characters: Yor Briar Forger | Thorn Princess, Loid Forger | Twilight, Anya Forger, Sylvia Sherwood | Handler Relationships: Loid Forger | Twilight/Yor Briar Forger | Thorn Princess, Anya Forger & Loid Forger | Twilight & Yor Briar Forger | Thorn Princess, Loid Forger | Twilight & Sylvia Sherwood | Handler Additional Tags: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Emphasis on hurt, Implied/Referenced Torture, Fucked Up, i wrote this while listened to hololive music, i just found that amusing, do not worry he is alive read it on AO3 at https://ift.tt/OwHZTs6

#IFTTT #ao3feed #fanfic #twiyor #spy x family #sxf #loid forger #yor forger

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patdroid · 2 months

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Okay. So…it’s really been a while. And I’ve been wanting to share some things about a few of my other characters; however, these aren’t for TADC.

…

They’re for Hazbin Hotel. (Yes, I’m a fan of the show. And any of my posts in regards to Hazbin Hotel have to do with my specific AU.)

And I’ve actually got three OCs to share for this one so-

Ryeley

Ryeley’s the first OC. She used to be an angel up in Heaven, but when she caught her angelic boyfriend with an exterminator (who was NOT Vaggie or Lute, for obvious reasons), she basically pulled a Mrs Mayberry on them both. However, the seraphim heard about what happened and banished Ryeley down to Hell. Now, Ryeley basically lives on as a fallen angel, but to make herself fit in, her look resembles a mix of a stink bug demon and a spider demon…with a regular demon tail on top of it. (What? Just because she’s as old as the universe, it doesn’t mean that she would know what every type of demon looks like.)

Age: As old as the universe

Birthday: 6/02 (June 2nd, not official), The day that the universe started (official, but the date’s unknown)

Gender: Genderfluid (But female presenting)

Pronouns: Ask, since they can change by the day

Orientation: Panromantic (and possibly demi-sexual as well, I’m still thinking about that one)

Crush: Chul Choon-Hee (You’ll find out about her soon)

A fallen angel from Heaven (who really wants to return back there…at least until she falls in love)

The yellow marks on her body is the blood from the angels that she ended; the fall just made it permanently stick onto her. (Trust me, Ryeley tried to wash it off when they first got to Hell, but found out shortly after that it was stuck to her body…forever)

Ryeley has a tendency to ask about certain things, but that’s because they never had a life on Earth

They have insect-like legs under her pants and shoes, but keeps them hidden from everyone for reasons

Okay. With Ryeley out of the way, let me introduce you to Ryeley’s crush; Chu-

Chul Choon-Hee 철춘희 (AKA: The Sleeping Boots Demon) {But you can call her The S.B. Demon for short}

Yep. You read that right. Chul Choon-Hee is based on a CARTOON CHARACTER, not only that, but a form of a cartoon character that only appears twice in the series, with the second time being a cameo! And the irony comes in when Chul would have no idea who that cartoon character is when she first arrived in Hell BECAUSE when she was a human, she lived in North Korea. I’m not kidding about that. Not only would she not know who the character’s real self is because she’d never seen the show, but she would also have no idea about the show because her country never received the dub!

But when I say that Chul’s based on a cartoon character, I mean that her design is based on it, since she’s a monkey demon. The way that she acts, on the other hand, is more like a soldier in an army; a given since she used to work for the North Korean army and her outfit almost matches perfectly with the outfits of that country.

Age: In her 20s or 30s

Birthday: 3/8/19XX (March 8th, during the 20th century; International Women’s Day)

Gender: Female

Pronouns: She/Her

Orientation: Pansexual

Crush: Ryeley

Languages she can speak: English and Korean

Death Date: 9/24/2004 or 9/25/2004 (Depending on time zones, either one of those two dates are correct. For Chul’s home country, the latter date is when she died, but for me, the one who created her, the former date is the right one)

Cause of Death: Cyanide poisoning via a banana

When she first arrived in Hell, she quickly noticed that most of her injuries were not visible…along with seeing the chaos around her forming around her (In my Hazbin Hotel AU, there’s a few times in Hell’s history when false demons arrived. 9/24-25/2004 happens to be one/two of those times)

Thinking quickly about the situation, she used her skills to help protect the false demons and use her new powers to stop the real demons from hurting the false demons, going so far as hurting the real demons. That one point in time got a few Hellborns (who somehow had access to some of Earth’s programming) to refer to Chul as “The Sleeping Boots Demon” or “The S.B. Demon”; something that Chul was definitely confused about until she managed to find out what the Hellborns meant

The particular method of attack is her specialty; “The 1-2-3-Knockout Method”. With that particular method, she uses her hair to float herself up into the air and pretend that she’s asleep; ala the character that gave her the demon nickname. Then, when another demon gets too close to her, that’s when she breaks out of her act and either ends the demon’s life (for some time) or knocks them out cold with her tail…or both of she’s really having a bad day

As she became more known in Hell, she earned the title of being an Overlord, with that nickname becoming her Overlord name, but everyone calls her “The S.B. Demon”, not only to save time with saying it, but also so people don’t have to tell certain demons about who Sleeping Boots is…multiple times over…and over

Yeah… Chul having multiple demon names makes a lot of sense when you take into account that not all demons would know of the one who inspired her name. And not all demons would be willing to find out about the inspiration, either because they genuinely don’t want to or because they don’t see television/computer games/picture books as a platform to make yourself known on. (I’m looking at you, Alastor.)

Now, for the last one, we actually do HAVE a Hellborn on the table and she’s-

Nina Tails

Okay… When am I ever going to be able to say the name myself? So, Nina Tails is definitely more of a rough gal than most. Having spent most of her life living within nature, she isn’t that trusting of other demons, but with the help of Charlie, she finds someone who can be a temporary mother figure until she can get adopted.

Age: 10 (as of the time of writing this)

Birthday: 2/16/2014

Gender: Female (but might question it later in life)

Pronouns: She/Her, but she mainly wants to be referred by her official name

Orientation: …she’s 10. She doesn’t even have a crush yet. We don’t know what it will be, so until she comes to that discovery, it’s TBD

Type of Hellborn Demon: Nine-tailed Fox

She lost her parents in the 2015 extermination, and to save herself from being exterminated, she ran into the woods to hide (This was BEFORE Lucifer talked to Heaven about sparring Hellborn demons from the extermination, because Nina’s parents were both Hellborn demons as well)

While living in the woods, she had lost her left eye from a hunter…who had an angelic steel-tipped arrow, meaning that her eye was GONE gone once it got her, but her quick reflexes is what saved her life

Because of the hunter incident with her eye, she is not afraid to bite other demons that come her way…along with any bears. She hates bears with a burning passion

Besides bears, Nina’s a friend to the animals in the woods

After getting adopted by Charlie, Nina has started to embrace her tomboy look and has decided to wear an eyepatch to hide the scars that she has from that incident

And…that’s all of them. Honestly, it seems nice to expand my range of content with the fandoms that I get into.

…

…and I see Chul being an age regressor to combat the years of trauma, pain, bullying, and general mental distress that she had endured when she was a human.

#hazbin hotel #hazbin hotel oc #original character #Ryeley the fallen angel #Chul Choon-Hee #Nina Tails

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thesafaribaggirl-returns · 8 months

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Get to know me better!

Repost. Don't reblog.

ALIAS / NAME: Tamlyn

BIRTHDAY: 12/13 19XX

ZODIAC: Sagittarius - The Archer

HEIGHT: Average

HOBBIES: Writing, outside of RP I usually write children's fantasy, I really enjoy sanitizing mythology for kids, I also read a lot of mystery novels and I play Gin Rummy.

FAV. COLOR: Green

FAV. BOOK: The Boredom of Haruhi Suzumiya by Nagaru Tanigawa is my favorite Science Fiction Novel and Coyote Waits by Tony Hillerman is my favorite Mystery Novel

LAST SONG: Victims of Contingency by Epica

LAST MOVIE: Black Jack The Movie

LAST SHOW: Murder She Wrote

RECENT READ: Otherside Picnic Omnibus 2 by Iori Miyazawa

INSPIRATION: I play Kaban and Rin with their characterization in Kemono Friends World Series, otherwise I just have mix and match canon so it sorta fits into World Series's canon

STORY BEHIND URL: Back when Kaban was the only muse here, I didn't have much experience with single muse blogs so the URL is entirely uncreative.

Tagged by @spooky-jumpropes

tagging @eternalstretchofmuses @awakenedmaiden @raktanag @halfkuma @nemekii

#ooc #friend gossip - tag games

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somebodytolove31 · 10 months

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The following are a series of letters shared between Detective Ramirez and Doctor Harris, discussing a possible demon haunting

CW for implied alcohol abuse, religious themes, paranoia, discussion of shock therapy and unreality

June 9, 19XX

Hello doctor, hope you are doing well. I am here once more to report to you about an interesting event that is occurring to me. I hope you don’t mind if I start to ramble too much.

I will cut the chase and go right to the point. For about a week now, there has been a knock at my office door everyday at 4am, no moment before, no moment later, and everytime I open the door there is no one standing on the other side.

At first I thought the secretary was fooling with me, but she’s as confused as I am. The boss also has not heard any complaints from the few others in the building that stay as late at night as I do. If I am being fully honest, I’m not really horrified by this occurrence, if anything, I’m annoyed. I already have a hard time falling asleep and being awoken in the middle of the night does not help.

Do you know if any of your books have information on this kind of thing happening, and most importantly, is there a way to get rid of it?

Kind regards

Detective D. Ramirez

--------

June 13, 19XX

Hello detective

My condolences for what is happening to you, it sounds exhausting.

From your information, it might be a sort of spirit. Some religions believe that smudging with sage is an effective way to cleanse negative energy from the environment, it might help you.

Doctor Harris

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June 19, 19XX

Hello once more doctor, I hope you are having a good day, I’m not.

The knocking has gotten worse, everyday it gets louder and louder, and it will not stop until I open the door. I thought of simply keeping the door open, but some fucking bastard closed it once more.

I tried the sage thing you suggested the moment the letter got to me, it did not work. And the cherry on the cake is that since that day I have started to hear voices too, something about letting them inside my head. I don’t think there’s too much to find inside my head besides shitty memories and smoke, but I still don’t want them in there.

I’m scared, I think I’m going to start staying at a motel. If you have any more information I can use to get rid of this, please do send it.

Kind regards

Detective D Ramirez

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June 23, 19XX

Detective I know you are not religious, but get a damn priest.

There is no way that’s a normal spirit, that’s a demon, get out of there and contact a priest.

Doctor Harris

--------

Hi doctr, I decded to slep ina motel th night afteri snt the las leter,it didnt work. doctor itsin my fkng head, i goig insane, i dontt wanto be put in amaniconmiun, i dont want tbe electroducted, itsknokin right now, helpme

Love, me

--------

June 28, 19XX

Hello doctor, I hope you are doing well

Last night I wrote something concerning, I would usually simply burn any drunken ramblings I write, but I think it’s important for me to send it to you this time so you have an idea of my headspace at the moment.

I have been sleeping in a motel room for the last 5 days, the knocking continues. I don’t know how to contact a priest, I have not stepped into a church for a long time after all, and I don’t want to ask my boss for a favor this time.

Anyone I can talk to about this would think I’m insane, I have no evidence or other witnesses, I went to the point of hiring someone to spend the night with me to see if they would hear it too, nothing, as always it was only me. You are the only one right now who does not think I’m insane.

You are coming to the state in a few days, correct? If I can make it to that day, I want to see you, I need to talk to you in person.

Until then

Detective D. Ramírez

#unreality #the detectiverse #detective d ramirez #the doctor

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gravityilluminated · 1 year

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{ ABOUT VERLAINE }

Warning: This character biography contains mentions of human experimentation, physical, sexual ( non graphic! ) & emotional abuse, medical trauma, existential crises, dehumanization, murder, violence, physical scars, mental instability & more. If any of these are a major trigger for you I heavily suggest not following this blog. HOWEVER, if you are really interested in writing with me, feel free to DM for a summarized, less upsetting recap for plotting purposes.

NAME: Paul Verlaine

ALIASES / NICKNAMES: The King Of Assassins, Arthur Rimbaud { Former }, Black No. 12

SPECIES: Gifted Human { Artificially Derived }

GENDER: Cis Male

AGE: 34 { Present }, 28 { Stormbringer }, 20 { Arahabaki Incident }

D.O.B: March 30th, 19XX

HOMETOWN: Metz, Moselle, Grand Est, France

NATIONALITY: French

APPEARANCE / STYLE: By all outward appearances, Verlaine is a perfectly normal man of French descent, in his late 20s-early 30s, albeit one who is consistently rather well dressed. Standing at about 6’0” tall, Verlaine possesses a deceptively slim physique, deep blue-green eyes almost the colour of turquoise, occasionally darkening to storm gray in certain situations depending on his mood or the lighting, & shoulder length blond hair. There is a small mole / beauty mark just to the outer corner of his left eye. His hair is usually worn braided along the hairline on the left side of his face, while his right eye is obscured by bangs, the braid is then tied with a black silk ribbon with the rest of his hair in a long ponytail that sits across his left shoulder. His preference for clothing include three piece suits made up of a jacket, backless waistcoat & trousers alongside dark dress shirts, formal ties & dress shoes. When Chuuya first encounters him, he is wearing a three-piece suit comprising a dark sand-colored backless waistcoat, matching trousers, & a light sand-coloured coat that he typically leaves draped on his shoulders & that carries a brooch on its lapel which looks like a bejewelled Northern Star. He also wears a black dress shirt with the sleeves folded to his forearms, together with a cherry-coloured tie tucked beneath his waistcoat. In addition, he dons white gloves, a black porkpie hat which was gifted to him by Rimbaud, and a pair of black dress shoes.

Following his recruitment to the Port Mafia, Verlaine’s style makes a switch to semi formal if he needs to go out. At ‘home’ he sticks primarily to trousers or dark jeans with fitted crew neck sweaters & cardigans, & Oxford style shoes or dress boots. Bodily, Verlaine has a lean & fit figure, with a rather fair skin tone. He has a mid-sized puncture scar on his chest with mild electrical burn scarring surrounding it from when Chuuya launched one of the metal spikes N had tortured him with into the blond’s chest. However, this is far from the largest or most brutal scar Verlaine has ever received. Beneath his clothing lay a story of untold suffering. Numerous layered scars - long & whipcord thin - run up over his back & diagonally across his shoulders & spine from previous beatings dealt out by his creator, Pan, along with smaller scars along his arms, legs & torso from the time he was shoved through a plate glass window due to his maker’s temper.

PERSONALITY: Originally, Verlaine was controlled by a series of codes programmed into him at birth with his personality being artificial, leaving him with zero free will & no inclination to do anything beyond obeying. After being freed from Pan's control he struggled with this fact as his true personality began to develop, alongside the trauma of being a man made weapon & the severe abuse he suffered at the hands of his creator. These facts along with the knowledge that he was not human caused him no small amount of distress, to which Rimbaud went to great lengths to help him cope. He was able to empathize with Chuuya Nakahara’s situation as a clone & refused to go along with the mission to capture the boy & hand him over to the French government for further experimentation. This empathy ultimately won out over his care for Rimbaud, & he attempted to kill his only friend to free a boy he did not know. He wanted to take the child somewhere far away where he’d never have to be cursed with the knowledge of where he’d come from, like Verlaine.

Unfortunately, without Rimbaud, Verlaine's sanity declined rapidly as he was no longer able to deal with his origins as a man-made being. His beliefs became warped & he decided to kill those Chuuya cared about upon locating him again to force the boy to kill N, whom he viewed as a monster just like Pan was, demonstrating his now unhinged personality. As described by Adam, Verlaine is a lone wolf & does not trust anyone. Moreover, as an assassin, he displayed an enigmatic & deadly nature, not immediately revealing his identity or goals with clarity. He once posed as a Mafia mailman to approach Chuuya despite being the stronger of the two, & he was very deliberate about his targets to force the boy to kill N. However, despite his planning, his downfall was that he did not expect Chuuya to decide wanting revenge against Verlaine for killing the Flags more than he wanted revenge against N for experimenting on him. His own bias & pain clouded his judgment, or else perhaps he would have taken Chuuya’s amnesia into account & the fact he has no memories prior to the age of 7 would contribute to his lack of desire to take vengeance on N, whereas Verlaine remembers every excurciating detail of his upbringing with Pan.

Despite his somewhat unhinged behaviours, Verlaine is not an evil man. He is in fact, incredibly lonely & frightened by the world around him which he views himself as being an outsider, causing his hostility towards it. He can be extremely possessive & protective of those he cares for & perhaps even overbearing, once lecturing Chuuya minutes after they met about having a weak punch & questioning whether he was eating properly. He’s capable of kindness, especially where children are concerned, & was able to make Kyouka, Gin & countless others first rate assassins without exception. By the time he was defeated, Verlaine was filled with remorse & a longing for his departed friend, choosing to exile himself to the basement in near total isolation. Once he’s learned to relax in a new situation he can be quite funny, often unintentionally, with a dry albeit at times dark sense of humour.

BIOGRAPHY: Paul Verlaine was ‘born’ under the name of Black No. 12 in France, during the late 1900s. Created by the independent researcher known as Pan, the blond was the first ever attempt at creating a self-contained Singularity, however since Abilities require a living host to function, the scientist programmed Verlaine with a coded personality & trigger words to activate the Singularity. He did not have a childhood, rather he was artificially sustained in a stasis chamber & his aging accelerated until he reached adolescence at which point he became the scientist’s attack dog. Unfortunately, Pan was not a kind man. He had quite the temper, & ruthlessly physically abused Black No. 12 despite him not having any ability to speak back or go against him in any way. Frequently the bouts of violence would come following one of Pan’s failures with his grudge against the French government & his tendency towards an explosive temper. Though Black No. 12 could not be anything but obedient to him, Pan often lashed out in a blind rage, including beating his creation, whipping him, & other acts of anger. By the time Black No. 12 had reached physical adulthood, Pan had also begun to sexually abuse the experiment he’d created, soon graduating into reoccurring sexual assaults as he grew older. Eventually, the spy, then going by the name Paul Verlaine, was dispatched to take Pan down due to how dangerous & unstable he’d become. After doing months of observation & research, Rimbaud broke into the base & destroyed the machine producing the ability user controlling metal powder that imprisoned Black No. 12, erasing the control triggers keeping him an emotionless puppet. Immediately, Black No. 12 broke free of his prison & murdered Pan in a blind rage for all the pain he’d suffered. As he had nowhere else to go, Verlaine took the being back to his superiors who promptly ordered he train the young man as a spy. He did so, eventually befriending him & giving him his own name, Paul Verlaine, after suggesting they trade ( as he was originally given the code name Rimbaud ).

The newly-dubbed Verlaine was naturally talented in espionage, mastering everything he was taught, & was soon assigned Rimbaud’s partner in the organization. Along the course of their endeavors, Verlaine struggled with the fact that he was not a real human & could be controlled. Therefore, Rimbaud gifted him with a bowler hat embedded with certain metals which allowed its wearer to control command sequences at will, allowing Verlaine to be one step closer to becoming a human with free will. A few years later, they became involved in the Great War & as a result of an internal conflict between the Transcendents of various countries. In the aftermath of that war, France learned that Japan had obtained a high energy level being they were using to create some sort of doomsday weapon, the duo was then send to Japan with the orders to take it & erase any evidence of its existence.

This being turned out to be a 7 year old human experiment who had been successfully merged with the deity known as Arahabaki. However, Verlaine empathized with the boy & wanted to save him from being made a test subject for the rest of his life, stating that he wanted the boy to be raised in a village with a new family without knowing anything about his past. Rimbaud did not consider Chuuya a human & refused to deviate from the mission. When it became clear Rimbaud would not allow him to take Chuuya - his partner going so far as to threaten to maim him to get him back ‘home’ - Verlaine decided to betray Rimbaud & shot him in the ensuing fight. Soon after, Chuuya & Arahabaki were released, causing a massive explosion. Subsequently, Verlaine began work as a lone wolf assassin known for killing high-ranking individuals on either side of the law. Branded as the King of Assassins, his calling card is to leave a cross carved from a locally grown white birch. He killed eight major figures throughout the world, including three military armory supervisors & a drug cartel boss. He eventually stained the Order of the Clock Tower’s reputation by murdering several ability user guards & almost successfully assassinating the Queen herself after actually killing her body double. Due to his notoriety, Verlaine became considered as one of the most dangerous threats in the world, comparable to the Seventeen Worldly Evils.

Following the Arahabaki Incident, Verlaine infiltrated the upper floor of the Port Mafia HQ in order to steal the files on Chuuya Nakahara, & retrieve Rimbaud’s hat. In the process, he murdered the security who were guarding Boss Mori’s office, & and destroyed the window to escape. Later, he voiced out his intent to take Chuuya with him, referring to him as "younger brother". One year later, Verlaine encountered Europole’s android detective, Adam Frankenstein, whose aircraft eventually crashes in a forest. Later, during Chuuya’s first-year Mafia anniversary, Verlaine ambushes & assassinates the five Flags sans Chuuya, who had been taken by Adam ironically in an effort to warn him about the threat of Verlaine. Disguising as a Mafia mailman, Verlaine retrieved Chuuya in an attempt to invite him in accomplishing various endeavors together as "brothers". The two, also later with Adam, break into a skirmish after Verlaine reveals having killed the Flags. During the fight, Verlaine tells Chuuya that the boy, like Verlaine himself, is not a human but a mere string of codes. To prove his revelation, Verlaine opens Chuuya’s Gate, unleashing Arahabaki for 0.3 seconds & ravaging the surrounding area. Verlaine also declares his plan to kill everyone who matters to the sixteen year old to grant him freedom as an act of love, then departs after Dazai arrives & closes Chuuya’s Gate with his Ability. Later, Verlaine visited Dazai at the shipping container where he lived, from whom he retrieved internal Mafia files they had negotiated over two days prior, promising to give the boy the death he so coveted when he eventually kills him. He soon storms the police station, where he incapacitates Adam & questions Sheep member Shirase about Chuuya’s childhood. Thinking that Shirase is one of Verlaine's targets, Chuuya rescues him from Verlaine, & the two battle each other once again. Ultimately, Verlaine spots the detective Murase & kills him instantly, being his actual first target, & retreats.

For his second target, a researcher named N - one of the men in charge of creating Chuuya, Verlaine breaks into a seclude military facility where he finds Chuuya being tortured by the researcher. Verlaine released the boy from his restraints & urged him to kill N, but Chuuya "double-crosses" him &, impaling him with a metal stake, voices out his animosity towards him despite their shared antagonism towards N. They fight once more, & once Verlaine attempts to murder N, the latter mentions knowledge of The Secret of the Gentle Forest, forcing Verlaine to keep him alive for questioning. Verlaine demanded him to tell everything he knows about The Secret of the Gentle Forest, which apparently contains knowledge surrounding Verlaine's origins, but N dodged his questions & slyly brings down upon him a skeleton of Chuuya's now deceased clone, controlled by N's technology. Disgusted by what N had done with the boy, he apologetically blasts off the skeleton & chased N down to capture him. He then blasts out of the facility with N & interrogates him atop a tower crane. Once he finds no use of N, he leaves him hanging on the crane & departs to kill his final target, Mori.

Sporting the train carrying Mori & derailing it, he found that "Mori" is a decoy, doubled by Ryuuro Hirotsu. With the plan masterminded by Dazai, Verlaine soon clashed with countless mafiosi, Ability users, & other forces, forcing him to activate Brutalization & unleash his Singularity, Demonic Beast Guivre. He decimated most of the fleet, until Chuuya & Adam poison him, being one of his few weaknesses. However, Verlaine's Gate opened again when N remotely activated Brutalization ( in revenge for the murder of his own younger brother, Murase ); before losing unconsciousness, Verlaine urged Chuuya to run & live, knowing he himself would perish once his energy supply ran out. As Guivre is unleashed in the battlefield & Chuuya and Adam are swallowed inside the beast, Verlaine shows Chuuya his memory of nine years ago when Verlaine & his partner Rimbaud stormed the military facility & abducted Chuuya. In this memory, Verlaine also shows him how to defeat Guivre.

Chuuya, tapping into Arahabaki's power, fights Guivre; as Verlaine asked him to stop Guivre, & Arahabaki unleashes his energy on the malevolent beast & finally defeats it. Verlaine then loses most of his ability & collapses, on the brink of death. However, he soon finds himself in Rimbaud's hyperspace. Rimbaud—using his Ability to turn humans into Abilities themselves—turned himself into an Ability, generating a self-contradicting singularity as he indefinitely repeats the process, & then gives the singularity to Verlaine as his new singularity in place of Guivre, while Verlaine remorsefully apologizes to his former partner. Realizing he hadn’t appreciated having the one person who cared about him over all else while he had it, the assassin covered his face & broke down in tears.

In the aftermath of the incident, Verlaine allowed himself to be locked up in the Mafia basement, unable to flee from European authorities after him & finding no interest in the outside world, though he could easily escape. With his skills as an assassin, he mentors elite mafiosi, including Kyouka Izumi & Gin Akutagawa, & countless others who would become first-class assassins during their brief training. Eventually, he is promoted to the rank of Mafia executive, still keeping himself locked up in the basement while awaiting "a storm".

FAMILY: “Pan” { Creator; Deceased }, Nakahara Chuuya { Formulaic Younger Brother }, Unnamed Clone { Formulaic Younger Brother; Deceased }.

SUPERNATURAL ABILITY: Verlaine’s Ability is called Song of the Rain. Similar to his younger brother’s ability, Verlaine can manipulate the gravity vector & magnitude of anything & anyone he gets in contact with. He can enhance gravity to crush & incapacitate targets in place, which Chuuya—a gravity manipulation ability user himself—cannot break away from to a fault. Initially, Verlaine's ability proved quite superior to Chuuya's own, giving the mafioso considerable difficulty fighting him. For instance, Verlaine's punches were described to be cannonballs compared to Chuuya's bullet-like punches. During their clashes, their gravitational forces would produce shock waves that ravaged anything in their proximity. Verlaine can increase his own body's density to land dense attacks on his opponents with his punches & kicks. He can snap his opponents' necks with ease using gravity, which killed Murase & nearly N, as well. In one occasion, he pierced through the vehicle he was driving into the ground after colliding with a semitrailer & withstand the truck's impact. He also used his ability to emit a gravitational pulse like a radar to search for a photograph on Chuuya’s person. In addition, he can manipulate gravity to prevent himself from falling over & erase his own gravity to land upside down on a ceiling. Verlaine can also manipulate his own gravity to launch himself out into the sky to escape & even blast through an underground facility way aboveground.

The assassin also can utilize the gravity of several materials around him in combat. He once expelled rubble in his hands like bullets and shot concrete fragments on the wall by laterally manipulating gravity. He can throw various objects at targets with relative ease but high strength, such as an entire car and a photograph like a projectile that pierced Adam after flicking it. Verlaine also partially buried Adam into a concrete wall, being pushed in by gravitational force after Verlaine set every piece of the rubble back in place. Dubbed as the King of Assassins, Verlaine is quite adept in assassinations that he performed using his ability. He was once able to assassinate elite Order of the Clock Tower guards, who possessed unparalleled abilities throughout the world, without leaving any signs of trauma. In truth, however, he fragmented their bones into 1,228 pieces almost simultaneously, which caused them to suffer respiratory failure until death. He was also capable of massacring in brutal fashion, such as the five Flags members whose corpses were highly dismembered; hence, they were describably more "broken" rather than "killed". Despite his powerful ability, Verlaine can still be outclassed, most notably by Chuuya in their later spars & his clone’s skeleton that was being controlled by N, one of the few beings who penetrated his gravity-manipulated guard. Moreover, a horde of gifted individuals ambushing him with their abilities one after another proved to be a challenge to Verlaine even with his ability, forcing him to activate Brutalization as a last resort.

Brutalization is the state when Verlaine's persona model is stripped off its seal by opening his Gate & he succumbs to the powers of the singularity, Demonic Beast Guivre. Verlaine loses consciousness in this state & is granted destructive, gravity-based capacities that could annihilate squadrons & disrupt landscapes. It can be activated by chanting the control incantation: “Your hate, your set torpors, your weaknesses, your spite. All the brutalities you suffered long ago, you return to us, all without evil, O Night. In an excess of blood that every month will flow.” Upon unleashing Demonic Beast Guivre, Verlaine undergoes a monstrous transformation. A gargantuan black beast that appeared reptilian & whose head resembled the beast Guivre, albeit with two glowing crimson red eyes that were positioned exactly like a human's. With thick arms, a robust torso, & a massive mouth, Guivre did not possess any organs nor was it made of physical matter, but rather it was the single location where limitless energy stored in the singularity condensed into. It also had a dinosaur-like body, claws, and a black tail. Its feet were enormous enough to flatten roads, highways, & even an entire hill.

In its early stages of manifestation, Guivre's body pulsated and kept on growing until it obscured the moonlit sky. Eventually, it grew comparatively colossal than the true form of Arahabaki. In general, Guivre looked nothing like any living being & was too bizarre for human comprehension. Incapable of coherent thought, Guivre was far too sinister to be called a god & was the embodiment of chaos more than a god of destruction. No more than a pool of hatred, it reacted to emotions & particularly responded to hatred, which propelled it to automatically move to attack anything hostile, & it could not discern which party was more dangerous than the others & who it would prioritize attacking. The living embodiment of negative emotion, Guivre responded to hatred & therefore reacted to anyone & anything that reacted to its presence, mindlessly attacking them possibly until it ran out of energy.

When it clashed with Arahabaki, black flames of hatred spewed out of its wounds and instantly regenerated its injuries. As it is a singularity that possessed an infinite amount of energy. Dazai theorized that it could run out of energy in a week, a year, or even "until the end of the world". In comparison with Arahabaki's rampage on Suribachi City, Guivre was believed to be capable of sinking the entirety of Yokohama if it unleashed the same power that Arahabaki unleashed. Made of no physical matter, Guivre innately possessed no vulnerabilities on its form that could be attacked by mere humans or abilities. It could not be damaged with fire, ice, and firepower. Similar with Arahabaki, Guivre could manipulate gravity in various forms & fashions with high offensive intensity, breathing beams of gravity to annihilate any target along with the surrounding terrain until nothing remained. It could also unleash gravitational spheres of darkness powered by hatred, generate laser-like black holes, hollow land in a straight line like creating a cliff with an abysmal pit. It could repeatedly generate black holes & once created at least 20 black orbs almost simultaneously. When incinerated by the ability weapon Annihilation, Guivre was able to withstand its intense heat by absorbing the singularity energy from the weapon's fiery sphere.

STRENGTHS / TALENTS: With numerous flawlessly executed assassinations under his belt & being ‘raised’ by Pan, the leader of a rebel force group that took up arms against the French government, Verlaine in an incredibly dangerous man who has more than earned his title of King of Assassins. He’s mastered numerous armed & unarmed martial arts over the years & can hold his own & frequently even outmatch even those with Abilities similar to his own. Aware of his powers at a young age, he was programmed knowing how to use them to their utmost advantage, such as increasing his body’s gravitational force & density, which cut a massive truck directly in half when it touched him rather than crushing him. Responsible for the training of numerous of the Port Mafia’s best fights, including Gin & Kyouka, he worked his way up the ladder to Executive without ever asking to join their ranks.

Dazai notes that there is nobody in the world who could beat Verlaine in hand-to-hand combat alone, forcing him to resort to other tactics. He summarily defeated & killed the skilled guards protecting the Queen of England’s proxy, slayed the Flags of the Port Mafia effortlessly & defeated the android Adam Frankenstein on a few occasions before his eventual defeat. Verlaine is quite elusive, which makes him difficult to be caught even by Europole, who’ve been after him for years. Furthermore, he inputted a command sequence in Chuuya to close his Gate upon contact, which therefore allowed Verlaine to deactivate Brutalization even without his consciousness. This eventually led him to regain said consciousness. Verlaine possesses an unparalleled competitive edge in battle owing to his tactical intellect together with his combat skills. Trained by Rimbaud himself, he’s also a master of modern espionage. Comfortably multilingual, Verlaine is fluent in several languages other than his native French tongue, including Italian, English, Japanese, Latin, Greek, Spanish, Chinese, Arabic, Korean, German & Russian, while being conversational in several others.

In preparation for taking Chuuya in following the explosion in the Yokohama Settlement, Verlaine taught himself several typical school grades ( both Japanese & French ) of knowledge on the off chance the bit desired an education, learning about history, art & music, science, arithmetic & mathematics, social studies, physical health / nutrition, theology, & more.

WEAKNESSES: Although unmatched in hand-to-hand combat, Verlaine was not as well versed on how to solo handle large groups of enemies attacking simultaneously, without the element of surprise on his side. In addition, due to the command sequence he placed on Chuuya’s Gate, when the two of them come into physical contact with each other, it will automatically close Verlaine’s Gate, thus stopping both Brutalization & Guivre in its tracks if Chuuya can manage to get close enough to him. In the non-physical sense of weaknesses & drawbacks, Verlaine struggles greatly to understand the feelings & motivations of human beings beyond the shallowest of definitions. He believes humans exist merely to do what they please without regard for any other, & that to be alive is to suffer. He also has a difficult time understanding his own emotions, often needing to reason them out with himself, due to his belief he is not human, & thus being unable to communicate what he’s experiencing. Despite this, he’s not without empathy; the first time he felt such a thing was upon gazing at the form of a small 7 year old boy who he realized may well turn out just like him if he allowed it.

Despite his absurdly powerful Ability placing him in the category of Transcendent, Verlaine’s Ability functions more or less the same way as Chuuya’s. Should Dazai be able to get close to him without dying in the chaos ( the ground opening crevices, trees falling, etc. ), he would most likely be able to nullify Guivre with his Ability ‘No Longer Human’. Additionally, without the metal powder or the hat that Rimbaud created for him, it’s possible to activate Guivre against his will if one knows the command sequence phrase to trigger it. As shown with Chuuya, Verlaine is weak to electrical based attacks & certain poisons.

RELATIONSHIPS / ROMANTIC INTERESTS: Arthur Rimbaud { Lover; Verse Dependent }

SEXUAL ORIENTATION: Bisexual

QUIRKS / HABITS: Verlaine has a habit of fiddling with things in close proximity to him when deep in thought, such as the knife he Carrie’s with him for slicing fruit, or nearby objects left on nearby tables. Incidentally, before even joining their ranks, Verlaine had the habit of wearing his coat over his shoulders rather than on his arms.

HOBBIES / INTERESTS: Verlaine has a strong interest in the Arts; poetry, literature, music, & drawing / painting in particular. He enjoys honing his fighting abilities in private, keeping his skills sharp. Infrequently, he’ll be accompanied by Kouyou in his bunker for cups of tea & casual conversation, which he appreciates. He enjoys fresh fruit, tea, coffee & wine, traditional French foods, & classic literature. Occasionally partakes in a good existentialist debate, though it would be a push to say he enjoys it. From time to time he’ll also visit Rimbaud’s grave, when he’s certain no one else will be around.

DISLIKES: Humans ( as a general rule ), human medical & cloning experimentation, particularly on children. Child abuse in general. When Rimbaud insists he is a human being. Chuuya not taking proper care of himself / not listening to him. Anyone laying unwanted hands on his brother.

SCHOOL: Homeschooled

CURRENT RESIDENCE: Yokohama, Japan

OCCUPATION: Port Mafia Executive, Freelance Assassin, French Intelligence Agent { Former }

FRIENDS / AFFILIATION: Nakahara Chuuya, Arthur Rimbaud

RELIGION / BELIEFS: Roman Catholic { Lapsed }

VEHICLE(S): N/A

POSSESSIONS: Anti-mind controlling hat { former; currently in Chuuya’s possession }, Rimbaud’s scarf.

OTHERS: He once met Fukuzawa on his way to assassinate some government officials many years ago, they exchanged blows but because their conversation intrigued him he let the swordsman go unharmed. The name of his Ability comes from Paul Verlaine’s real life poem called Ariettes Oubliées III { Forgotten Ariettes 3 }, in his collection Romances Sans Paroles { Songs Without Words }, which was published during his imprisonment following the shooting of Rimbaud.

#{ BLOG INFO }

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tsukiyadori · 2 years

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The brilliancy continues---

Tsubaki: That's to say, BL that has no ero-stuff is just missing out on something! Ghost-Katsura: YOU DON'T SAY!! (Fudanshi Kazoku, Chapter 36.3)

This is so HILARIOUS. And also just so true to life, too!

I was half worried with how after chapter 34 the author Suzuri Machi called it the final chapter of Tsubaki and Hiiragi's story on their Twitter account (11th June 2022) that that was the last we'd see of them. But the author was also tweeting random ideas of how the two would be like together right after, so probably just their story ending as a focus plotline. (And then ch35 and even 2/3 of ch36 are entirely looking like they could have taken place in any point of time of the series, so neither confirms not denies it any way.)

Ch36 pleasantly shows Hiiragi is still very much part of the story as is their relationship, as is Katsura, and it remains great. And at the same time, you even get a snapshot of the present day state of the genre!

But to keep it more chronological: Ch36 starts of with a few antics of Sakura and him having produced a card game with BL tropes lingo. All the while kinda calming me down, I'm definitely not too deep down into the rabbit hole, since I have the same question marks as Kaede, lol. (But I'm not going to research those tropes, nope, sorry narrator.)

Which winds up the family three talking about their preferences and tastes in plots by the middle part of the chapter. Eventually it comes to the "super darlings" or your ideal character of your fantasies.

And Tsubaki starts to ramble off his idea of it:

Tsubaki: Somebody who drives a limousine, who has a stupidly luxurious house, has an island in the south and would bring you there or owns stuff like an oil field Kaede: So somebody who's super rich? Tsubaki: Who would use all that excess wealth to buy the uke in a black market auction Sakura: Human trafficking… Tsubaki: And who would kidnap the uke, imprison him and so all sorts of things against his will (also has a bed so big you can swim in it) Kaede: Rape on top of confinement op top of abduction… Tsubaki: That was supposed to be my super darling…. Something like that was supposed to be what I likeeeeeed….. Sign on Tsubaki: Born in the 19xx Sign on the kids: Born in the 20xx Kaede and Sakura: You like a criminal with a lot of money? Narrator: The flow of time is scary.

Is this a jab on the history of BL, how it was still filled with problematic, violent hot garbage around the turn of the century? How your tastes and tolerances vary depending on what you grew up with? Definitely. And it's hilarious, because yeees, I feel the generation gap too, despite even having started including BL in my readings really late.

But, since we know he likes Hiiragi and everything with him couldn't be more compf, it's also making a nice case about that fantasies and your likes in there may have nothing to do reality.

Does that make it a jab to his disbelief that your fantasies vs. who you wind up actually liking in the end? Maybe.

And the third and last part of the chapter takes this even further, and the bridge is such a brilliant arch over.

Kaede draws an ero-stuff card. And he himself likes it more light and without it, although he'd also read the horny stuff, too. Sakura has a bigger ratio of stuff with it, but is wondering if he should be saying this in front of his family.

And then there is Tsubaki:

Tsubaki: I like the BL manga with super perverts and explicit depictions. (Come at me with the gibbly sex depictions.)

And yes, he likes the other stuff too, they are all wonderful, but this is what I like reading most!! (Whilst the kids are wondering if he has any sense of shame.)

We all still remember what Tsubaki went through the other chapter, right? So this is what this one scene of two panels does, it's essentially screaming out loud:

TO HELL WITH "PRUDISM = ACE"

as well as

ACE != ENTIRE DISINTEREST IN THE SUBJECT

These are two conflations I've been taking increasingly more note of as my age piles up. And it's starting to get a bit irksome.

The scene also makes a hilarious case, that with ace you can easily wind up being completely clueless or overwhelmed, or uneducated (see everything Tsubaki with Hiiragi), but at the same time also be way way too unhinged things out of this realm and make a shameless fool of yourself. (See everything when it comes to his readings.)

This can really be a hard tightrope to dance and one that can, uhm, go a bit down the wrong rails. (Like maybe don't talk about your sexually frustrated rabbit pet in a train...)

And then it proceeds with the above opening snippet.

Tsubaki: That's to say, BL that has no ero-stuff is just missing out on something! Ghost-Katsura: YOU DON'T SAY!! Tsubaki: Just now - I got a very cold shudder Sakura: I also heard a female voice Kaede: Eh? Stop it your two… Narrator: That night the ghost of a fujoshi with long hair showed up next to Tsubaki's bedside saying "If that's so, then let yourself be embraceeed~~"

Yes, Katsura is still a crazy invested fujoshi. Also yes, watching Tsubaki being so slow must have been atrocious for a heavy shipper like her. Also yes, this is a super self-aware, hilarious poke to your series' own BL plot.

But also that reaction is so, so déja vu hilariousness. Your fantasy preferences have nothing to do your preferences in reality by default. You can be every bit ace and not want it for yourself, but read a bulk load of romance or even erotica. This is something people regularly get confused at. (But then they also don't get that consuming a bulk load doesn't even have to mean you dig the thing. You could even be grinding though them all for research. As in actually literal research, not that research.) But at the same time I can't even fault them, because it's almost impossible to explain in a comprehensible way.

But it also does line it up with an analogy that has surprisingly a lot in common with it: The discussion about dubious tropes. Everyone agrees that the content of these tropes is terrible. Does it make you like and love them in the real, just because you like stories about them in media? No, right? You could like mystery and thrillers, but that doesn't equate to you loving serial killers. You could like reading about a plot with dub- or even non-con. Doesn't mean you would like to be raped. You could not be able to drink alcohol and still be interested in the biochemistry, history and culture surrounding it. You could not want to eat sweets and still be interested in the art of confectionary. You could like reading, watching or talking about romance or erotica, without it immediately meaning that you want it to happen in your own life.

Not so difficult and yet notoriously hard to explain, and this chapter did it in so little amounts of space~

And it also has something compf to stress about the genre, too, when Hiiragi comes over having been invited by Sakura, and they start picking out BL books for him to read:

Hiiragi: I'm fine with any content. But I enjoy and like to read the ones with happy endings most. Tsubaki: ... Sakura: There are a lot of happy endings in BLs. Leave it to us [to pick you some out].

Just another snapshot in time for the genre. It's not been that long that the genre was rather tragedy addicted. (In all sorts of ludicrous ways, too. Heart of Thomas or Boys Love, anyone?)

The last page, is also really nice:

Hiiragi: It's lively and fun, isn't it. "Family" that is. Tsubaki: ... yes it is...

LOOK AT THOSE FACES.

Yes, is a bit of a jab to Tsubaki's workaround expression of "family" that he used to communicate his ideas on his relationship with Hiiragi. But it's also a sort of cozy secret word between them with a hidden meaning only they alone are privy to. Does it matter what behind it has a name? Or even a wrong one? Maybe the answer is actually a simple no, at least for as long as both participants understand what is being meant. (It's a bit like going forward with a good example and unwittingly throwing shade at what a lot of the labels wars completely forget as they rage around for accuracy.)

Because for a start, what's it all matter for as long as there are literal sparkles in your life?

#manga #fudanshi #腐男子家族 #ramblings #english translation #translation #japanese translation #suzuri machi

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classic-games · 3 months

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Strikers 1945

Developer: Psikyo Publisher: Atlus Release: 06/28/96 Genre: Shooter Imitation is a sincere form of flattery. Strikers 1945 bears more than a passing resemblance to Capcom’s 19XX series, down to the player ships and level design. But it quickly deviates and becomes its own thing in short order. For years message board chatter painted it as one of many great Saturn games you will never get…

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#1996 #Atlus #import #shmup #shooter

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littleguyconnor · 11 months

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Some stuff about Cepheus…. I love them a normal amount. Questions are from writing-with-sophia :] sorry this is so obscenely long 💀

What is the character's full name? Any nicknames?

Cepheus Howlite Addison. Ceph, lovingly given to them by Opal.

What is the character's date of birth?

October 15, 19XX

Where was the character born and raised?

Cyber City, a small, run-down apartment complex.

What is the character's cultural background?

Addison

What is the character's occupation? Are they like their job?

Psychologist, school counselor, and assistant teacher. They are notoriously an odd fit for their occupation.

What are the character's hobbies or interests?

Arts and crafts, non-fiction books, poetry, the absurd and graphic parts of history, flower pressing, psychology

What is the character's favorite food? How often do they eat it?

Coffee. Every day.

What is the character's favorite music?

Heavy metal

What is the character's favorite book? Quote?

Lemony Snicket’s “A Series of Unfortunate Events”, Edgar Allen Poe.

What is the character's favorite movie?

They do not enjoy movies.

What is the character's favorite place to visit?

The darkest, quietest part of a library.

What is the character's favorite color? Less favorite?

Black and white for favorites, bright, gaudy colors for least. Anything in between is not preferred but tolerable.

What is the character's greatest fear?

Failing to help someone.

What is the character's greatest dream?

Being able to protect those who need it.

What is the character's most cherished memory?

Receiving their PhD, meeting Opal.

What is the character's most painful memory?

Anything of their past.

What is the character's biggest regret?

Not being able to help a certain white Addison.

What is the character's biggest accomplishment?

Starting their life and education form zero.

What is the character's relationship with their family?

Non-existent. They cut contact years ago.

What is the character's relationship with their friends?

A bit awkward, but they mean well and try their best. They are grateful for the one they have.

What is the character's relationship with their romantic partner?

They have yet to find anyone. (Unless?)

What is the character's relationship with authority figures?

Distaste. He had many encounters with police as a child, mainly for theft. They didn’t acknowledge it was out of necessity.

What is the character's relationship with their community?

Strained. They don’t hate the people who have hurt them in the past, but feel remorse and disappointment that they lash out at those who are different. It was a part of why they pursued their occupation.

What is the character's relationship with their culture or heritage?

They acknowledge it, but feel distant. He hates the rigidity, severe focus on productivity, and the tendency to alienate those who differ from its structure.

What was the character's childhood like?

Unfortunate. Housing was unstable and food was never guaranteed. They lived with an abusive father who blamed them for the family’s situation. Petty theft became a needed skill to ensure he lived. They made enough money from stealing and odd jobs to afford and education, and moved out soon after.

What was the character's education like?

They tried their best to receive any form of it at all. School was rocky and unsure at first, but after showing promising grades and skills, his teachers helped him to enter college.

What kind of trauma has the character experienced?

Verbal abuse, bullying, societal alienation, insecurity.

What kind of romantic relationships has the character had in the past?

None.

What kind of friendships has the character had in the past?

Support from a few teachers that acted as a parental stand-in.

What kind of enemies has the character had in the past?

There were plenty of people who hated him, but no real enemy asides from his father.

What is the character's moral code?

Very punk-ish in nature. Most of their concern has to do with the well being of children.

What is the character's political stance?

Left. More appropriately, anti-monarchy.

What is the character's religious or spiritual belief?

None, but has hope in Lightners.

What is the character's biggest flaw?

Their avoidant nature. They’re almost always alone in everything they do, and are resistant to socializing. Also, his lack of self care.

What is the character's biggest strength?

Their integrity.

What is the character's sense of humor like?

Dry, if he has one at all.

What is the character's level of self-awareness?

In terms of self sabotage, very low. They often work overtime and place the weight of the world on their shoulders.

What is the character's level of emotional intelligence?

High. Not so for themselves.

What is the character's level of intelligence?

High.

What is the character's level of physical fitness?

Lean.

What is the character's favorite way to relax?

Listening to audiobooks or scientific lectures while they craft. Occasionally, they may indulge in tea Opal had suggested they try.

What does the character do when they're feeling overwhelmed?

They don’t do well. Usually these feelings spiral into a cycle of frustration and guilt at their supposed lack of competence.

What does the character do when they're feeling bored?

Talk to Opal. They often have great book suggestions.

What does the character do when they're feeling angry?

Bury themselves in their studies.

What does the character do when they're feeling anxious?

Try to ignore it as long as possible, avoid the situation, self isolate. This has resulted in being forced to take vacation days many a time from their friend.

What does the character do when they're feeling lonely?

They’ve grown used to the feeling.

#deltarune #the addisons deltarune #addison oc #cepheus #my writing #ig?#I might do this with Opal too #Oh also!#Howlite is the name of the stone they’re based off of ^^

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